


The Morning After

by Callisto



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Humor, Influenza, Season/Series 01
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-08
Updated: 2011-04-08
Packaged: 2017-10-17 18:24:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/179868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Callisto/pseuds/Callisto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>“Oh that does it, Sam. We are so not doing this dream shit. I listen in respectful silence to that whiny garbage you over-share--“</i></p><p><i>“Whiny...! Winona Ryder as Hamlet is not--”</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	The Morning After

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Ancasta for the beta.

“I dreamed I was naked under my clothes.”

Sam looked at him. Stopped walking to do it. Dean got a pace ahead then stopped too.

“What? You asked, and God help me I’m telling you.”

Sam didn’t even try not to laugh. “Dude, everyone’s naked under their clothes. You gotta do better than that.”

The swipe at his shoulder was expected, so it missed. The headlock didn’t. Dean wrapped his right arm around Sam’s neck and reeled him in, walking on as he did so.

“Oh that does it, Sam. We are so not doing this dream shit. I listen in respectful silence to that whiny garbage you over-share--“

“Whiny...! Winona Ryder as Hamlet is not--”

“--that whiny garbage you over-share at 2am, because I’m out of my head and have no upper body strength to use on you. But that gunk you forced down my neck last night... What was that, by the way?

“Nyquil,” managed Sam.

“No shit. That was all?”

“And a little Jim Beam... Dude, my back...”

“You are a freak and a genius at times, Sammy, I swear. See? Upper body strength all back now.”

Sam could see it perfectly. And feel it too, down each and every vertebra. Dean brought them to a halt and Sam was staring at damp asphalt when Dean leaned down to his left ear. “So I don’t have to say squat now if you’re going to mock. Shame on you.”

“Dean...” Dean wasn’t hurting him, not really. But the zip on Dean’s jacket was going to leave a cheek crease if his brother pulled him in any harder. Sam shuffled on and tried a cough.

“That hasn’t worked since you were twelve, moron. But on account of me being hungry, you being pitiful and the diner being a step away, I will let you go.”

Finally released, Sam straightened slowly and glared. But he couldn’t be mad, not when Dean had the energy and good humor to actually jerk his chain like this. Three days of Dean denying he had flu had about driven Sam to distraction. Witches and werewolves could carve his brother up, and he’d toss Sam the first aid kit and tell him to get stitching. But a lowly microbe? No way it was felling one I-never-get-sick-Dean-Winchester. Until it had, of course, and Dean had all but passed out in a shivery heap with nowhere to go but wherever Sam put him. Which had been in bed, under six blankets, and had resulted in a lot of tossing and turning. In one of Dean’s lucid moments, between bouts of sweating and kicking at the covers Sam had him pinned under, Sam asked about his mutterings. Which had led to the whole dream thing, and to a tired Sam rather foolishly waxing lyrical about his own.

“When you’ve finished making faces at me, you can go in there and buy me pie, and not ever tell me about your dreams again. Ever. Jesus.”

Dean was pale, the circles under his eyes were dark, and one night had not flushed it all out of his system. But the hand had gone from around Sam’s neck to the small of his back, resting there, warm and steady like always. Sam smiled, got one back, and figured business as usual was well on its way.

And if Dean were himself again...

Sam blocked his brother’s entry into the diner with an arm across the doorway.

“’Over-share’? That’s kind of an Oprah word there, Dean.”

“Bite me. At least I was naked in mine, I wasn’t listening to some chick recite Shakespeare.”

This time Sam let the cuff connect, let it propel him inside to warmth, pie, and conversation he never missed until he’d done without it for a couple of days.

******


End file.
